Inside Out
by staceycj
Summary: Set S5. What does a soul that has been to hell look like?


"You really trust your brother?" the demon asked, purple eyes flaring and twinkling with delight as it taunted Sam.

"With my life." Sam said with unwavering resolution, with unwavering devotion, with unwavering love.

The demon laughed. "Even after what he did in hell?" Sam stood straighter, his eyes narrowing.

"You mean even after what you made him do in hell?"

The demon held its hands up and tried to give its best innocent smile. "I didn't make him do anything, none of us made him do anything, we simply provided him with options. And he decided… he chose… to take us up on the one that would relive HIS pain. Just like you chose to take Ruby up on a certain offer." The demon chuckled when it noted Sam's breathing getting heavier and his body going rigid.

"My brother is good. My brother isn't like me. He isn't tainted. He went to hell to save me, to protect me, and if to protect himself he had to torture a few souls that were in hell because they deserved to be, then so be it. It doesn't matter."

"Oh but my sweet little Sammy Winchester it does. If you could see what your brother has turned into you wouldn't be so quick to jump to his defense."

"What are you talking about? He's Michael's vessel, he's pure, he's good, or an archangel determined to destroy your kind wouldn't want to be all up in him so bad."

"Oh, that soul of his that you don't think is tainted…" The demon laughed a little. "Oh, it's tainted. And he is the one who tainted it. You should see him. You should see how he really looks." And the demon's eyes went wide and his lips curved into an evil smirk. "And Michael, he hasn't seen the merchandise. He just knows that he wants it. It's like buying that perfect Corvette and going to take it for a test drive and finding out that it's transmission is wrecked." The demon laughed. "Oh Michael, has no idea what his vessel is truly like because if he did, he would be seeking…" The demon paused looking for the right words, "alternatives." He finally said and Sam found himself seething.

The rage in Sam's belly began to bubble, which was oh so easy for it to do lately, and he Sam rushed the demon and had the knife to his throat, and he spat "My brother is good, my brother is not like us, my brother isn't the shit on the ass of the devil like we are." The demon simply smiled, and its host opened its mouth and the demon smoke flew out and if Sam hadn't been holding the man by the neck he would have slumped to the floor.

"Damn it!" Sam yelled furiously.

***

Sam hurried back to the motel, eager to account for his whereabouts and to tell Dean that there are demons in town. _Freaking can't even go to the library without demons or angels finding me, it must not matter what hex bag or rib carvings I got, there must be a tracking system on my ass or something._ That thought made Sam stop and swallow hard. Maybe in addition to being able to kick demon ass, and aiding in becoming Lucifer's vessel, maybe the demon blood acted like a GPS system. _Damn it!_ Sam thought as he pulled open the door to the motel room.

"Dean we've got demons." Sam started and threw his coat on a nearby chair. "Some demon with purple eyes that was telling me all kinds of crap that I don't understand, when you get out of the bathroom I'll tell you word for word about it. But damn man, they find me like termites find wood. I wonder if it has something to do with the blood, if it does, I don't know how we're going to be able to lay low, because it's not like I can scrub my blood, God knows I've tried. And speaking of which, then it would suggest also that whoever cleaned me up and put me on that plane didn't get the blood out of my system, they just managed to neutralize the addictive effects. And if that's all true, we've got to do some serious rethinking, or maybe I need to get another tattoo." Sam sighed. "Maybe another, this time to hide me from demons as well as keep me from being possessed." A thought flittered across Sam's mind as he sat down on the chair in front of his laptop. "You think there is an Enochian symbol we can tattoo on ourselves that will keep angels from making us their puppets?" Sam laughed a little and headed to his regular sites and began looking for any information on a demon with purple eyes.

He was about to turn and tell Dean something else when he realized that Dean still wasn't' in the main room and the bathroom door was still closed. He pulled his long legs back underneath him and went to the bathroom door, and knocked. "Dean? Dean?"

"I'm here Sam." He said in a low gruff voice.

"You okay man?"

"Fine. Go away Sam." The tone and sound to his brother's voice confused him and ultimately made him worry something was off and when something was off, it generally meant that something was seriously amuck.

"Dean?" Sam grabbed the bathroom door and found it locked. They never locked the bathroom door, it made it too difficult to get to the other when it turned out to be something bad, and that it was locked now ratcheted up the worry into fear. He pulled at the knob again and twisted it trying to get it to open. "Dean! Let me in."

"Go away Sam. Just don't come in here." His voice sounded frightened now more than gruff.

"What's wrong Dean?"

Pause.

"Dean?"

"Just not feeling well."

"Dean. What is going on?"

"Go. Away. Sam."

"Dean." And without further adieu, Sam pulled out his lock pick kit and began the simple task of picking the lock. Dean started shouting, and there were scuffling sounds, and Sam remembered that there was a window in the bathroom, and for a split second worried that Dean would escape but then remembered that the window was nailed shut and then painted over so many times that they both had remarked that it would take a chisel to get the damn thing open.

Sam got the lock picked and he pushed the door open and found his older brother huddled in the corner of the shower, his knees up to his face and his hands tucked in between his knees and his face.

"Sam. Go!" Sam didn't listen, as was his nature, and went to his brother and crouched in front of the huddled figure, and put his hand on his brother's shoulder and almost fell back on his butt, his brother's shoulder normally muscled and tight with tension, was weak and thin, something was the matter.

"Don't touch me!" He wailed as soon as contact was felt. Sam didn't let go, instead he tried to pull his brother out of his crouch. "No! No! Sam. You can't! Please don't!" Dean wailed and sounded as if tears were involved.

"What's wrong Dean?"

"Just get in the car and put as much distance between the two of us as you can. Just go, just do it!" Dean said with such panic in his voice that it hurt Sam to hear.

Sam got into the shower with his brother and sat down on cold porcelain in front of his huddled brother, never braking physical contact. "No. Remember we're in this together. We are going to stay together, tell the truth, and be who we are, because that is the strongest defense against these bastards. So, no, I'm not going to leave you. I won't do that again. I'm done running Dean. I promise."

Sam felt his brother start to shake underneath his hands and he slowly lifted his head. Sam's eyes widened and he fell back against the wall. "Dean!" Sam said tightly. The sight of his brother scared the hell out of him. "What's, what…what happened?" he asked once he regained his barring and sat back up. Dean's yellow filmed eyes leaked a tear down the long, gaunt face, circumnavigated the sores on his cheek, and dripped off of his skeletal jaw.

Dean shrugged. "I don't know Sammy." He said flashing rotting fang like teeth, as he looked down, trying to hide his hideous face from his brother. "I was watching something on tv, my stomach hurt, and I ran in here, and when I looked in the mirror I saw this looking back. Oh God. Not again." He murmured and tried to hide his face in his knees. Sam swallowed hard and got as close to his brother as he could.

"What do you mean again?"

"This is how I looked in hell."

"What do you mean what you looked like in hell?" Sam asked as the blood drained from his face.

"This is what I did to myself."

"What?" Sam asked. Dean lifted his head, looked away from Sam, tears still running down his papery skin, and some running into the thin line of his mouth, while others ran down his face, and dropped onto his clothes, leaving a green smear.

"In hell." Dean said slowly and quietly. "In hell, you look like you until you succumb to hell's influence. The moment I picked up the razor, the moment I started torturing, I started to change, and I didn't notice it until it was too late, until the process had gone this far, and by then, I didn't care, by this time, I wasn't completely human anymore. This must be what my soul looks like. Oh God!" He sobbed and Sam had no words, no clue how to consol his brother, how to fix it, or its cause.

"What can I do Dean?"

"Go away. Leave me. Just get the hell away from me!"

"I can't do that."

"Go!!! Go!!!" Dean shouted, face furious and chest heaving. Sam didn't waver. He looked at his brother full in the face, all of his hideousness out in the open for all to see, and he never wavered. "Why aren't you leaving Sam? Why?" The tears came faster.

"Like I told you in the panic room, I guess I'm just not that smart."

"But…"

"And if your soul looks like that, we can only imagine how hideous mine is. Because my sins are blacker than yours will ever be."

"I tortured people. I tortured souls for years! No amount of demon blood can make your soul worse than this." Dean said with conviction, he wiped the tears from his wrinkled, death tainted skin with a hand that was graced with elongated fingers and black fingernails.

Sam shrugged. "You tortured souls that weren't unblemished before; I've destroyed people who were good people. I've betrayed my family. I'm Lucifer's vessel. My soul is worse than this."

"How can you say that Sammy?"

"Because truth is truth Dean." The two sat there in the bathroom starring at each other, one soul turned inside out and the other still with its shiny packaging still intact, but each tainted and twisted.


End file.
